The Cage (episode)
While investigating an 18-year-old distress call, Captain Pike is captured and tested by beings who can project powerfully realistic illusions. Summary on the bridge]] The [[USS Enterprise (NCC-1701)|USS Enterprise]] receives an old radio distress signal from the planet Talos IV. A landing party led by Captain Pike discovers survivors from the crashed [[SS Columbia|SS Columbia]], which was on a scientific expedition for the American Continent Institute. Among the survivors is a beautiful young woman called Vina. Distracted by the woman, Pike is captured by the Talosians and taken to an underground prison. It is revealed that the crash site and the survivors, Vina excepted, were all powerful mental illusions made by the Talosians to trap the Enterprise and Captain Pike. The Talosians have severely weakened because they haved used their mental powers for so long. They want Captain Pike and Vina as breeding stock for a new, stronger race to repopulate the barren planet surface, which was ravaged by nuclear warfare. enjoy an illusory picnic outside Mojave]] They try several illusions on Pike to make him interested in Vina, all based on Pike's memories. These include an unfortunate mission to Rigel VII and a pleasant picnic outside Pike's hometown of Mojave. When these illusions don't work, the Talosians also capture Number One and Yeoman Colt to give Pike a choice of women. ]] Pike discovers that strong primal emotions cancel out the Talosian mental powers. He uses this knowledge to take a weapon from the Talosian magistrate, and escapes with his crew to the surface. There, the Talosians confront Pike with their demands. Pike refuses to cooperate, to the point where he prepares to overload his weapon and destroy himself and his shipmates to prevent this from happening. At this point, the magistrate's aides arrive, presenting the summary of the ship's records. To their dismay, the Talosians learn that humans possess a strong hatred of captivity, even when pleasant, making them too dangerous for their needs. Pike asks if mutual understanding or trade might not accomplish the restoration of the planet for the Talosians, but is told that humans would learn their power of illusion – to their destruction, as well as that of the Talosians. Pike and the female crew members are free to go, but Vina (despite her attraction to Pike) decides to stay on the planet, because underneath the Talosian illusions, she is badly deformed from the crash of the Columbia. The Talosians agree to take care of Vina and release the other crew, providing Vina with an illusionary Captain Pike to keep her company. Memorable Quotes "What the devil are you putting in that thing -- ice?" "Who wants a warm martini?" "What makes you think I need one?" "Sometimes, a man will tell his bartender things he'll never tell his doctor." :- Pike and Dr. Boyce "Now you're starting to sound like a doctor... ''bartender."'' "Take your choice. We both get the same kind of customers -- the living and the dying." :- Pike and Dr. Boyce "No, don't talk -- don't say anything... I'm filling my mind with a picture of beating their huge, misshapen heads to ''pulp!. Thoughts so primitive they block out everything else; I'm filling my mind with hate!"'' "How long can you block your thoughts; a few minutes? An hour?" :- Pike and Vina "I'm going to gamble you're too intelligent to kill for no reason at all (tries the weapons). On the other hand, I've got a reason. I'm willing to bet you've created an illusion that this laser is empty. I think it just blasted a hole through that window and you're keeping us from seeing it. Do you want me to test my theory out on your head?" :- Pike, to the Magistrate "This is the female's ''true appearance."'' "They found me in the wreckage; a dying lump of flesh. They rebuilt me -- everything works. But they had never seen a human. They had no guide for putting me back together..." "It was necessary to convince you her desire to stay is an honest one." "You'll give her back her illusion of beauty?" "And more." :- Vina, Magistrate and Pike Continuation Afterwards, the Federation imposed General Order 7 on the Talos system, preventing anyone from ever approaching the planet again under penalty of death. (TOS: "The Menagerie, Part II") :Several non-canon stories in comics and novels have chronicled continuations of this story: *Star Trek: Starfleet Academy: Issue *Star Trek Annual (DC volume 1) *Pocket TOS: "Legacy" Background Landmarks * This was the first ever episode of Star Trek produced. NBC rejected the pilot but made the extraordinary move to order a second pilot ("Where No Man Has Gone Before"). Almost all footage of this episode was later reused in "The Menagerie Part I" and "Part II." * The first filmed scene from "The Cage" (and of Star Trek) -- the cut with Dr. Boyce and Captain Pike sharing a martini -- was filmed on Friday, November 27th, 1964. Cast * Leonard Mudie, who has one line of dialogue as one of the Columbia survivors, was a veteran of dozens of films dating back to the 1930s. He was 81 when this sequence was filmed, and he died the next year. He is the oldest actor ever to appear on the original Star Trek and the first to pass away. * In one brief part of the first transporation sequence, the transporter chief's assistant is a man wearing glasses, but the scene changes and he appears without them. As far as is known, he is the only starfleet member ever so depicted until Kirk later acquires an antique pair in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan. * Leonard Nimoy (Spock) and Majel Barrett (Number One) are the only actors to appear in both this episode and the final episode "Turnabout Intruder". * Leonard Nimoy is the only actor to appear in both this episode and the second pilot "Where No Man Has Gone Before". * This is Nimoy's first Star Trek appearance. Malachi Throne (Voice of the Keeper) was also with him during his final Star Trek appearance, the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode "Unification II". * After the crew beams down to the planet surface of Talos IV, Spock is seen limping as he walks toward the singing plants. It's been mistakenly stated that Nimoy had suffered an injury prior to filming. In fact, however, Nimoy's limp here is feigned, and is a small plot point in the script. The original story for "The Cage" indicated that Spock, Jose Tyler and others had been wounded in the fighting on Rigel---events which take place just prior to the action in "The Cage." In the actual script the fighting is referred to, but it's never directly indicated that Spock had been injured. (The Making of Star Trek) Story and production * The captain's name was changed constantly throughout the writing of the story and script. First it was Robert M. April, then it was Christopher Pike, then as late as November 20, 1964, in the Second Revised Final Script, it was James Winter. Seven days later, when filming began, it had been changed back to Christopher Pike. * The ape creature seen in the Talos zoo originally appeared in The Outer Limits episode "Fun and Games", looking quite a bit different, and was created by Janos Prohaska. The owl-like bird creature seen down the corridor also appears in an episode of that series. Several of Prohaska's creations would be modified and make appearances in episodic Star Trek. * An imprisoned species is seen only by its shadow -- the last cage in the zoo contains a large crab-like creature with huge claws. In Gene Roddenberry's original conception, the Talosians were crab-like aliens. This would have been prohibitively expensive and probably unconvincing, so they became humanoids instead. * The Talosian seen down the corridor as Pike looks at all the imprisoned creatures was a midget. This gave the appearance of great length to what was actually a short, forced-perspective hallway. * The episode is difficult to reconcile with canon, as Spock smiles and uses several human expressions which he seldom did in the subsequent episodes and films such as "buzzing about down there". * Spock's cry of "Switch to rockets, we're blasting out!" is very anachronistic – there are no references to rocket engines in the episodes to come. * Dwight Eisenhower, John F. Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson make the only contemporary presidential appearances in an original series episode, as images in the Talosian download of the ship's computer. * When doing makeup tests for Vina as an Orion slave girl, the film kept coming back without the green skin being visible. Puzzled by this, the makeup crew kept painting the poor actress again and again with other shades of green, hoping that it would become visible on film. Afterwards, they discovered that the film processing lab was recolourising her because they didn't know she was meant to be green. Sets and props * The briefing room, transporter room and bridge in this segment are identical to the sets used in "Where No Man Has Gone Before". * As opposed to the electronic clipboards used in the regular series, Pike uses a very 20th century metal clipboard. A television also appears in his quarters. * A "captain's hat" can be glimpsed in passing on top of that television, although Pike never wore it. And after this episode, the hat and the landing party jackets were never seen again. * The bed in Pike's quarters was way too short for Jeff Hunter. His feet are extending well beyond the end of the mattress as he briefly reclines on it. * In the original story for "The Cage," there was an opening scene in the hangar bay where Pike, whose character at this stage was a tad older than later written, was inspecting new crew members. He remarks disapprovingly to the doctor at one point about the young age of some of these. "Something," Roddenberry later wrote in a memo, "that Jim Kirk, the boy wonder of the academy, never would have done." In this same scene (which was never filmed due to time and budget restrictions) Pike sees off the ship a number of badly wounded crewmen. Amongst these is an unhurt officer whom Pike (then Capt. April in the script) is sending back in disgrace, because he fired on friendly aliens. The officer argues that they were monstrous in appearance; how could he know they were intelligent enough to have weapons? These protests are met by the captain's stern dismissal: "Get off my ship Mister." (The Making of Star Trek) Miscellaneous * "The Cage" may have been inspired by the Twilight Zone episode, "People Are Alike All Over", which also featured a telepathic Susan Oliver tricking a human (Roddy McDowall) into a zoo cage. http://tv.msn.com/movies/movie.aspx?m=131618 * Footage of the asteroids from the beginning of this episode is reused later in "Mudd's Women" and "The Doomsday Machine". * The opening establishing shot of the Enterprise is reused in several early episodes: "Where No Man Has Gone Before", "The Corbomite Maneuver", "Mudd's Women", "The Man Trap" and "Charlie X". * CBS was approached first with Star Trek, but they passed on it for another sci-fi program called Lost in Space. Ironically, they are the current owners of the Star Trek franchise. * Although male voices were dubbed in for the Talosians, all the Talosian actors were actually women. * Throughout most of the first and second seasons, the "singing plant" sound heard on Talos IV would become the standard background noise on various planets. Beginning with "Spectre of the Gun", a different, warbly sound was used for a number of the remaining shows. The sound was used as the beam sound effect in the series proper. Links and References *VHS edition available through Amazon under ISBN 6300213056. Starring as young Lt. Spock]] *Jeffrey Hunter as Christopher Pike Guest Star *Susan Oliver as Vina Co-Starring *Leonard Nimoy as Spock *M. Leigh Hudec (Majel Barrett) as Number One *John Hoyt as Dr. Phillip Boyce *Peter Duryea as José Tyler *Laurel Goodwin as J.M. Colt Uncredited *Meg Wyllie as The Keeper *Jon Lormer as Dr. Theodore Haskins *Clegg Hoyt as Pitcairn *Malachi Throne as The Keeper's voice *Mike Dugan as The Kaylar *Georgia Schmidt as First Talosian *Robert C. Johnson as First Talosian's voice *Serena Sande as Second Talosian *Felix Silla as a Talosian *Barker as a Talosian *Adam Roarke as Garrison *Leonard Mudie as a Columbia survivor #2 (Unnamed humans) *Anthony Jochim as a Columbia survivor #3 *Ed Madden as the Enterprise geologist (USS Enterprise (NCC-1701) personnel) *Robert Phillips as the space officer on Orion colony (Illusory people) *Joseph Mell as the trader on Orion colony *Janos Prohaska as the Anthropoid Ape/Humanoid Bird (Aliens) Production staff *Robert Herron - Pike's stunt double (credited as Bob Herron) *Frank da Vinci - Stunts *Penny Romans - Choreography for Susan Oliver's dance References American Continent Institute; class M; ''Columbia'', SS; computer tape; Earth; horse; human; hyperdrive; laser; laser weapons; martini; micro record; Mojave; nitrogen; nuclear weapons; Orion; Orion slave girl; Orion colony; oxygen; radio; radio-interference distress call; Rigel; Rigel VII; Talos star group; Talos IV; Talosians; Talosian singing plant; Tango; time barrier; time warp factor; Vega; Vega colony; Vulcan; warp drive; yeoman Other references Africa; Alaska; Antarctica; Arctic Circle; Asia; Australia; Canada; Delaware; diaphragm; Dwight Eisenhower; Europe; eye; flower; gall bladder; intestine; Japan; John F. Kennedy; kudu; Abraham Lincoln; liver; Luna; lung; Mariner 2; Mars; Maryland; Mercury; USS Monitor (ironclad); Nimbus 1; North America; North Pole; optic nerve; orbit; orbiting geophysical observatory; orbiting solar observatory; Pioneer 5; polar orbit; President of the United States; probe; Ranger 3; Ranger block 1 type; Ranger block 2 type; Ranger spacecraft; American Civil War; American Revolution; rib; rocket; satellite; Saturn V; skull; star chart; stomach; Sol; Sol system; South America; South Pole; Soviet Union; United States; Venus; Virginia; CSS Virginia; George Washington; Washington, DC; wildebeest Cage, The de:Der Käfig fr:The Cage nl:The Cage sv:The Cage